


All That Comes to Pass

by malevolentmango



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, First Meetings, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Shipwatch Week 2017, Sirens, siren!Sombra
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-17
Updated: 2017-07-17
Packaged: 2018-12-03 06:56:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11526927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malevolentmango/pseuds/malevolentmango
Summary: Satya just wants a quiet day at the beach, away from the collection of oddities that she's slowly learning to call friends back at Watchpoint: Gibraltar. But there's someone even stranger waiting for her at the water's edge.





	All That Comes to Pass

**Author's Note:**

> For Day 1 of Shipwatch Week 2017: Fairy Tale/Mythical AU
> 
> Thank you to [Tsoleil](http://archiveofourown.org/users/doctorqui) for being the best beta and to [Lefty](http://archiveofourown.org/users/lefthand) for saying "WOW" in all the right places. ; )

Satya has never been to the sea.

 

In her youth, she'd had no money, and at Vishkar, no time. And objectively, she doesn't really see the appeal. There are far more pleasant things she can do in her free time than deal with the unpleasantness of getting sand everywhere.

 

But still, something about the water calls to her. The way it rushes in with the tides, the way its colors shift in the sun in the holovids. The way it drops off into a vast nothingness, dark and deep and teeming with a mass of unknown things. A world without order. It should not fascinate her as it does.

 

Plus, she's in Gibraltar. There's really no excuse to skip it.

 

It’s a relief to get out of the base for an afternoon. The recalled members of Overwatch have been working steadily to make it habitable once again, but several of the rooms are still coated in dust, piled with belongings long since abandoned. And there’s always _someone_ around - bustling in and out of rooms with cleaning supplies, making entirely too much noise in the firing range, jogging (or in that criminal Lúcio’s case, _skating)_ through the halls. Satya is thankful that she’s only here temporarily, as an emissary of sorts on behalf of Vishkar to aid in the development of the recently reinstated Overwatch.

 

A part of her will miss it, though, when she returns to Utopaea. The distrustful stares that had followed her during her first few weeks here have since given way to friendly greetings, to invitations to tea and shopping ventures into the city of Gibraltar.

 

She’s been part of a team since Vishkar pulled her out of Hyderabad, but it’s only with this mishmash of personalities in Overwatch that it finally _feels_ like she is.

 

Satya steps gingerly onto the sand, the warmth of it soaking through her shoes. She glances back up towards the base on the hill and then reaches down to slip them off, setting them neatly off to the side of the path where it meets the beach. There's no one around to see her - according to Genji, who had told her where to find the old, overgrown path, it doesn't get much traffic because it’s so much smaller than the others that Gibraltar has to offer. And indeed, it barely looks like humans have been here at all. Just the sand and the waves and the washed-up bits of evidence of what lurks in the depths beyond.

 

By the time she reaches the shoreline her feet feel like they're burning, and she steps gratefully into the cool water. It laps around her ankles as she walks along the beach, watching the ships float into the harbor across the bay. It's...peaceful, she thinks. The predictable ebb and flow of the water, the line of trees that marks the barrier between beach and inland, the whisper of music on the wind. Everything in its place.

 

Except for the woman on the rocks.

 

The outcrop of boulders looks severely out of place in the otherwise pristine landscape, splotches of nearly black stone against the bright white sand. They form a jagged ring around a larger rock, and Satya might be able to convince herself that she'd simply not noticed the rocks before now, but there's no way she could have missed the woman who lays across the central one with her arms outstretched, fingertips brushing the sand. It’s as if the whole setup has appeared out of nowhere.

 

She catches the edge of a smirk on the woman’s face before she stretches, the folds of her tattered purple dress sliding up her thighs, and Satya shivers despite the heat of the day. Something’s definitely wrong with this situation, and she’s uncomfortably aware that her hard light gauntlet is in her room back at the base, along with her projector. Both completely useless to her now. The uneasiness breaks across her skin and her hands clench into fists at her sides as the woman on the rocks climbs sinuously to her feet. She glides through the sand as if it barely phases her at all.

 

Satya knows she should leave, should try to run away, but she can't seem to make her body acknowledge those commands. She's trapped in place, rigid, as the woman approaches, helpless under the curve of her wicked smile.

 

When she reaches Satya, she lifts a hand to her cheek, running cool fingers down the side of her face.

 

“Ah, you're a pretty one,” the woman says, her voice lilting and with a hint of an accent that Satya can't place. Smooth, unlike the sharp tips of her nails that glide across Satya’s cheek, leaving red-hot trails in their wake. They may as well be claws. “Guess it's my lucky day.”

 

Satya finds her voice, even if her legs won't obey her. “Who are you? What do you want?”

 

The woman laughs, and the sound fills Satya with dread. “Oh no, this is about what _you_ want. The one thing you want, the one thing you _need_ most in this world.”

 

“That answers neither of my questions.”

 

For a moment, the woman looks startled. And then she laughs again, and this time it's a beautiful sound, high and free like birdsong echoing over the water. Something real in the unrealness of this whole situation.

 

“Not just a pretty face then, are you?” she says, before she disappears from view. Satya gasps, looking around, when the voice continues from behind her. Too close, fingers brushing her hair aside, warm breath across the back of her neck that makes her shiver. “You may call me Sombra.”

 

“And what do you want?”

 

Sombra circles around her slowly, and when she's facing Satya again she can see that her eyes are roving up and down her body appreciatively. Satya still can't move, so she glares instead, waiting for an explanation that never comes.

 

“I know what you need, my dear.” Sombra licks her lips, as if she can taste Satya’s desires in the salt of the air. She raises a hand, palm to the sky, and tilts her head, as if about to make some kind of grand reveal. And then she frowns. “You need...answers.”

 

There's a long moment of silence, in which Satya tries to figure out what on earth that means and Sombra just stares at her, curious, as if the more closely she looks the easier the puzzle will be to solve. The waves roll over her feet, but Satya only feels it distantly.

 

Finally, Sombra speaks again, her voice quieter than before. “Return to this place in three days, as soon as the sun sets. You will have your answers, pretty girl.”

 

A rush of anger boils through her, forcing the words through tight lips. “My name is Satya.”

 

“Hmm,” Sombra says, a smile crossing her face once more. Her voice is almost a purr. “Return to me then, _Satya._ You will not be disappointed.”

 

“But at what cost?”

 

Sombra chuckles, and Satya wishes she could call it a trick of the light when her eyes flash a bright, molten gold. “Information is power,” she says, before disappearing once more.

 

The world comes rushing back all at once, leaving Satya feeling dazed, stumbling as she regains control of herself. The sun is brighter than she remembers, the sand hotter, the waves rushing in louder. The rocks are gone, and Sombra with them.

 

Satya thinks that the beach is highly overrated.

 

~~~

 

Siren.

 

That's what Athena had so helpfully provided in response to her inquiry about strange beings who prey on a person's desires. And finding a more _logical_ explanation has so far proven fruitless. Eyes don't appear golden in the sun. Holograms can make rocks pop into existence, but they can't make them _solid,_ and she would recognize a hard light construct if she saw it. Satya can make people appear and disappear, but there were no teleporters on that beach - not anywhere close enough for Sombra’s little act.

 

And contrary to popular belief, the sight of a beautiful woman does not actually cause temporary paralysis. She’s double-checked that one.

 

Satya doesn’t believe in myths and folktales. But apparently that doesn’t prevent her from being _in_ one.

 

She knows she could ask either of the Shimada brothers - the resident experts on Creatures That Should Not Exist - but every time she tries to phrase the question in her head, it just comes out sounding laughably absurd. So instead, she researches. And while she never expects to find any actual _proof_ that sirens even exist, she's surprised at what she does find.

 

Tales of men lost at sea, shipwrecked, chasing the sound of the siren’s irresistible voice offering to give them everything they could ever want. Graphic descriptions of those who survived long enough to make it to the source, where they would be devoured. Statues and paintings that look nothing like the woman Satya met on the beach, aside from a vague alluring quality that had her staring at the images longer than she should.

 

There’s no reason for her to go back. She remembers the feeling of dread that had overcome her when she first saw the rocks, the terror when she discovered she was unable to move. The way Sombra had smiled, the way she’d dragged her claws down Satya’s skin with just enough pressure to leave faint red lines, the low rumble of her voice, the vision of her stretched across that rock, highlighted by the sun…

 

And the promise of answers, to questions she hasn’t yet asked.

 

She curses the cruel mixture of curiosity and attraction that draws her back down to that beach on the third day.

 

~~~

 

The last bit of sun still hovers over the horizon when Satya arrives. The beach is just as empty as it had been the last time, and the place where the rocks appeared is just another bare stretch of sand. She's sure it's the right place. With any luck, this will all have been just an awful hallucination.

 

Her luck runs out as soon as the sun sets fully.

 

Between one blink and the next, Sombra is there, minus the rock formation but plus an incredible set of wings. They're outstretched to either side of her - massive, purple fading into pink at the tips, glowing slightly gold along the bones and joints like a network of electrical circuits - feathers still fluttering slightly, as if she's just used them to land.

 

“You can...fly?” Satya says by way of greeting.

 

Sombra chuckles. “Well I didn’t drive here,” she says, which is the closest she’s ever gotten to receiving a straight answer. “It’s not exactly flying though...you’ll see.”

 

“I absolutely will not.” Satya takes a step backwards, as if putting more distance between them will somehow help. She doesn’t think it will, but she _does_ realize that she isn’t frozen in place this time - that she can control her own movements. It settles a bit of the uneasiness that’s bundled up in her chest.

 

“Don’t you want your answers, Satya?” Sombra tilts her head with a coy little smile, amused by Satya’s actions. “Isn’t that why you came back?”

 

“I--I don’t know…”

 

“I think you do.” Sombra takes a few steps towards her, slow and measured. “I think you went back up to that so-called _secret_ base on the hill, and you figured out what I am, and you still decided to come back. Because you have questions. About what your employers are really doing, about why they sent you here.”

 

Satya inhales sharply. She hasn’t voiced those concerns to anyone, has barely let _herself_ think about them. Before the panic can take hold, Sombra holds her hand out into the space between them, palm up, waiting.

 

“It’s your choice. But I’m thinking you already made up your mind.”

 

Satya stares at the outstretched hand, at the fluttering of Sombra’s dress in the light breeze, at the sloping curves of her wings, now folded down at her sides, before finally settling on her face. That ever-present smile, full lips over too-sharp teeth. Her eyes are glowing gold.

 

She barely has time to register that Sombra’s fingers are cool to the touch before she’s whisked away, her body seizing up in one brief moment of terror as the world drops away beneath her feet. It’s over in an instant, but her heart's still pounding and it takes several deep breaths before she realizes that she’s incredibly _warm._ She’s pressed up against Sombra, her huge wings wrapped around Satya like a feathery cocoon. She jolts away from the contact, Sombra’s wings falling away behind her again, but far from feeling uncomfortable she realizes that she’d felt...safe. It’s a strange and incongruous feeling that she doesn’t want to examine too closely.

 

“Sorry, beautiful,” Sombra says, not seeming sorry at all. “Not exactly flying, like I said.”

 

“It is alright.”

 

Satya clasps her hands in front of her, twisting her fingers around each other, as she takes in her new surroundings. She’s in a spacious dark room with no windows, completely open with spaces set aside for a kitchen and a bed. But the focal point of the room is a large array of monitors against the back wall, a veritable command center, complete with stacks of servers glowing with purple lights. Each screen shows a large, grinning skull symbol.

 

A good likeness, she thinks, glancing at the similar grin on Sombra’s face as she observes Satya.

 

“Do you...live here?”

 

Sombra’s wings fold up behind her, and when she walks over to switch on her computer, Satya notices that they seem to have disappeared.

 

“You were expecting a rocky island in the middle of the ocean?”

 

Satya follows slowly, watching as the screens light up with more streams of information than she could ever follow all at once. She thinks of all the things she read about sirens in the last three days, and how nothing she’d seen had prepared her for any of _this._

 

“I’m getting the feeling that you are the wrong sort of person to have expectations about.”

 

Sombra glances over her shoulder at Satya and waves a hand to invite her in closer to the monitors.

 

“You’re not wrong.”

 

Satya inches forward, sitting down straight-backed on a rolling chair that Sombra slides over to her with her foot. She remembers a particularly disturbing image she saw in her research and frowns.

 

“Does this mean you’re not going to eat me?”

 

Sombra lets out a burst of laughter, her fingers pausing in their rapid-fire pursuit across the keyboard. She leers at Satya, her grin turning sly. “That can still be arranged.”

 

It takes a moment for Satya to parse her meaning, but when she does she can feel her cheeks heating up.

 

“But no, I won’t. You’re far too...interesting to waste on a simple meal.”

 

Satya stares at her. “So you...normally would have?”

 

Sombra doesn’t respond. Satya remembers the sharp points of her teeth, and shivers.

 

Before she can asks any more questions, the familiar Vishkar logo appears on the large central monitor. Satya purses her lips, twisting her fingers around in her lap, and tries to prepare herself for what she’s about to hear.

 

She expects to be surprised by what Sombra shows her, but the feeling of resignation that comes with it is almost worse. Endless items flash across the screens - confidential Vishkar briefings she’s never seen, detailing the secret plans behind missions she’d been part of; emails to and from the president of LumériCo, prior to the company’s global scandal; images from the destruction in Rio de Janeiro that have tears welling up in her eyes. More and more, and it’s almost too much, but Sombra seems to know which things to click past and which to let her dwell on and read in their entirety.

 

When the screens go dark again, Satya takes a few moments to just breathe. She doesn’t protest when Sombra lays a hand on top of hers. Satya looks down, considering their hands for a moment, before allowing herself to lace her fingers through Sombra’s. It’s not an action that she would usually find comforting, but after what she’s just witnessed, she’ll take what she can get.

 

“I suspected,” Satya says quietly. “But this is...so much more.”

 

“The price of answers,” Sombra says, and Satya lets out a reluctant chuckle.

 

“Perhaps I should have asked for money.”

 

Sombra hums. “It doesn’t really work like that. Money’s not what you wanted most.”

 

“Is that why you...kept me alive?” Satya asks, her fingers clenching more tightly around Sombra’s. “Because I wanted _this.”_

 

Sombra doesn’t respond immediately. She reaches over to pick up a datapad from a low shelf next to the monitor array, tapping away at something Satya can’t see with her free hand. Finally, she says, “Most people only care about a few things - money, sex, power. It’s easy enough to lure them in. Predictable. Not much fun when you’ve been alive for as long as I have.” She meets Satya’s eyes. “You were different. Not that you don’t care about all those other things, but your desire to know the truth outweighed everything else. I wanted to know why.”

 

Satya supposes that’s...flattering, in a way. To stand out from the crowd. But it leaves her feeling oddly bereft.

 

“And now that I have those answers? What am I to you now?”

 

Sombra puts the datapad on the desk in front of them and turns to face her fully. She leans in close, and this time Satya goes rigid of her own accord, her heart racing in her chest.

 

“You’re still very, _very_ interesting,” Sombra says, her eyes flickering down to land unmistakably on Satya’s lips. She tilts her head slightly and adds quietly, “May I?”

 

Satya hesitates for only a second, in which she wonders how on earth she got from a quiet walk on the beach three days ago to _this,_ before nodding once. In the next instant she’s trying to remember how to breathe as Sombra closes those last inches between them, capturing her lips in a sweet, fervent kiss. It doesn’t last very long, but it _feels_ like an eternity when Sombra finally breaks away, leaving a last parting kiss to the side of her mouth.

 

When Satya’s eyes flicker open, she’s met with a riot of color on the wall next to Sombra’s computer station that had once been dark. Sombra’s hand hovers over the datapad, manipulating a web of lines that coalesce into a ball and then reappear on the wall behind her, forming an expansive network of geometric shapes and the lines that connect them.

 

She spots the Vishkar logo immediately, but there are others. LumériCo. Overwatch. Talon. Flags representing countries across the world. Names and faces of people she’s met and people she hasn’t. All connected. And in the center of it all, a grinning purple skull. A plan, ready to be set into motion with a flick of Sombra’s fingers.

 

“You have my help,” Sombra says, and when Satya tears her gaze away from the spectacle to stare at her, she looks...almost human. Vulnerable. Her deep brown eyes wide, expectant, as they search Satya’s face. “If you will accept it.”

 

For a moment, she’s at a loss for words. With this kind of information, this access, this technology...she could do so much. She could make the world a better place - do what Vishkar is _supposed_ to do, rather than what they are doing. In the end, it’s not much of a decision at all.

 

“I think I would be a fool to decline.”

 

Sombra grins widely, once again exuding confidence, and says cheekily, “That would’ve surprised me more than anything else you’ve done.”

 

That pulls a smile onto Satya’s face, even after everything. She wonders what else she’ll be able to come up with to surprise Sombra next.

**Author's Note:**

> If you'd like to freak out about Symbra with me, you can find me on tumblr [here](http://malevolentmango.tumblr.com).


End file.
